The 51st Congress (1889-91) was tagged as the Billion Dollar Congress, a profligate Republican-run legislature that raided the Treasury in an effort to pay off all its supporters. The 111th should go down in history as the Trillion Dollar Congress. An enormous energy package passed during a lame duck session would be a fitting epilogue for the Trillion Dollar Congress, which has been consistently out of step with the public mood.

The only reason to pass such a major piece of legislation during a lame duck session is because the proposal is unpopular. If Democrats could sell the bill to their constituents, they would pass it before the November elections then campaign on it. Party leaders must also expect that the political will for this bill will not exist in the 112th Congress after the voters have spoken in November. In other words, the new representatives coming in are not going to vote for it - so Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and Barack Obama had better get the representatives who were just fired to support it before they're forced into early retirement.

Jobs to Drop Out. The best way to land a job during President Obama's tough economic recession is to declare your intention to run against incumbent Democratic Senators in 2010 or 2012.

Terror Target: Manhattan New York's police commissioner says it's a big mistake to write off failed attacks as the work of incompetents, and he's developed his own intelligence apparatus to make sure they don't succeed

Environmentalists as Battered Spouses. Greens keep returning to their abuser after another promise to do good, but nothing in President Obama’s oil spill speech should offer them any hope that the administration is really going to change.

The PIIGS Who Fell to Earth. James C. Bennett, former UPI correspondent and author of The Anglosphere Challenge, imagines Angela Merkel calling a few of her closest friends in the highest offices about the financial crisis engulfing the governments of Europe.

Drunkblogging Obama’s Oval Office Address. Hard to believe, but President Obama's speech is being billed as his first Oval Office address to the nation. Vodkapundit's Stephen Green is ready — martinis in hand.

The big winner? Bobby Jindal, whose 63 percent approval (65 percent on handling the spill) is the highest for any senator or governor in PPP’s polling this year. He lost some of his righty rock-star luster after that SOTU disaster, but I think it’s safe to say that he’s gotten it all back: The latest is that he’s lost patience with BP’s containment efforts and given the order to the National Guard to start building a barrier wall off the coast to try to protect the shoreline. 70 percent, here he comes!

The Democrats' latest "extenders" bill didn't just come up short, it failed spectacularly in the Senate, losing by a vote of 45-52 with 12 Democrat defectors. The bill would have extended unemployment benefits, again delayed Medicare cuts, and added $80 billion to the deficit.

Certainly, the violence displayed by Etheridge is one issue, but another issue is, why should Etheridge care who is asking a legitimate question? I could care less who asked the question and if they want to remain anonymous forever then that is fine with me. They have no obligation to reveal their identity to anyone. The left seem obsessed with trying to find out who dared ask this question to a big, brave Congressman so they can try to discount and destroy the questioner. Let them wonder forever.

There's an added layer of irony here as well. As Planet Gore contributor Chris Horner rehearses at length in his book Power Grab, the prime architect of the cap-and-trade idea was — you guessed it — former BP CEO Lord John Browne. So there is a special kind of cognitive dissonance going on in the juxtaposition of BP bullying and carbon tax cheerleading.

You see why this is absolutely necessary, don't you? What if nothing is done and global warming... doesn't happen? What a disaster! But if disastrously extreme measures are taken and then global warming doesn't happen? What a great relief! It will be impossible to tell whether the solution worked or whether global warming just wasn't going to happen anyway. Win-win

At Shaggy's restaurant and bar on the docks in Pass Christian, Miss., heads immediately turned toward the five televisions when the president began speaking. Glasses stopped clinking, and food sat on plates as customers watched and listed intently — for about 10 minutes.

As the president's address went on, interest waned and conversation returned to a loud chatter.

Keath Ladner said the speech gave him some hope, even though his seafood processing business has shut down since the April 20 rig explosion killed 11 people 50 miles off the Louisiana coast and triggered what Obama called the worst environmental disaster in U.S. history.

Ladner just prays things begin to change.

"Words are only words. Action means everything," said the 48-year-old who owns Gulf Shores Sea Products in Lakeshore, Miss. "Right now, I believe we need a little bit more government oversight to make sure things are handled properly."

John and Margaret Ehrenreich couldn't depend any more on a clean Gulf Coast that will attract tourists to Pensacola Beach, Fla. They have a miniature golf course, a parasailing business, a go-cart track and personal watercraft rentals as part of their business, Bonifay Watersports.

The couple largely agreed with the Obama's speech, but said they still weren't encouraged about the future of their business. And they're not relying on Obama or BP for that.

"We know that at the highest levels they understand our plight, but we are going to have to get through this on our own. It's not up to him, it's up to us to keep going," John Ehrenreich said.

The couple has survived major hurricanes and economic slumps, but they don't know how they will weather the oil spill.

"I'm not going to say we are going to get through, but we will take it one day at a time and do whatever we can," said John Ehrenreich, 68 who immigrated to the U.S. from the former Yugoslavia at age 15 and built his beach business after discovering the town while serving in the Navy.

Back at Regina Shipp's restaurant, the food is gourmet-quality yet affordable — the view over Perdido Bay, beautiful. Yet the oil spill has gutted the couple's business so badly they're worried about caring for their two young daughters if conditions don't improve quickly. They've filed a $33,000 claim with BP, yet they've only gotten $5,000.

Shipp, 40, hopes Obama's tough talk about BP making pay for the damage wasn't just words, but she has her doubts.

"BP has killed our environment, killed our economy and destroyed our way of life, and they get to say who they're going to pay?" she said.

What Obama Needs Is a Change of Job Description. This whole oil spill mess just sort of highlights the fact that Obama has no idea what a president is supposed to do. (Note: Stephen Green will be drunkblogging the president’s address to the nation tonight.)

Pelosi: Ethics Are OverratedHouse Speaker Nancy Pelosi is sending private signals that she is willing to support watering down the powers of the Office of Congressional Ethics. It's official, she is the swamp that must be drained.

The more relevant figure is 4,700. If my quick calculation has it right, that’s the number of days since the last time a BP CEO was in the Oval Office.

On that day, August 4, 1997, then-CEO, (then-Sir) John Browne, joined by Ken Lay, met in the Oval with President Clinton and Vice President Gore.

Their mission that day? As revealed in the August 1, 1997 Lay briefing memo whiih I was later provided — having left a brief dance with Enron after raising questions about this very issue — it was to demand that the White House ignore unanimous Senate instruction pursuant to Art. II, Sec. 2 of the Constitution (”advice”, of “advice and consent” fame), and to go to Kyoto and agree to the “global warming” treaty.

Oh, and to enact a cap-and-trade scheme.

Oddly, President Obama tonite will telegraph that he’s really going to stick it to BP tomorrow and give ‘em…the cap-and-trade scheme they concocted with Enron (spare me the hysterics, comrades, as I have detailed and explained in various ways here, here and here, I was in the room).

Read the whole thing and follow the links if your stomach can handle it.